“religion’s been cruel to people like usthe darkwood sluts the good time girlsbut god as my witnesssome of us we’re just trying to wrangle our powerback from the species that took it”
Jemima Foxtrot’s Treasure is a shining work of alchemy and liberation which explores power dynamics, sex work, desire, and female friendship with a fresh and playful perspective. Foxtrot investigates shimmering sexualities, the economies of desire, the theft of childhood and pathways towards reclaiming it. Her language is lush: intimate, intricate, full of fertile earth’s possibility. The poems of Treasure live up to its name: showing us where the gold is—the joy—how to feed it into the soil of our lives.
“Treasure is an aptly chosen title for this collection, both as a noun (that quantity of precious ore dug from the stuff of experience) and as a verb (the imperative to seek out, sing, and cherish joy through the sharing of it). Foxtrot is a savvy, sometimes savage, sensualist; her poetic speakers alert to injustice, but alive to pleasure in every way that counts. These are superbly tactile poems, poems of being-in-the-body, and being-in-the-world; they are full of wit, vigour and feminist jouissance. These are also formally exciting poems, poems that showcase a beautifully bold and oddly tender lyric defiance.” Fran Lock, Hyena, T.S. Eliot Prize Shortlist